CBT helps you understand the link between your thoughts, emotions and behaviour. This is important because sometimes, when you talk about things that are difficult, you may feel worse to begin with. CBT will help you discover skills like:

How to understand your individual problem more, as you’re the expert in your problem.

Identify links between your thoughts, emotions and behaviour.

Arrive at an individualised formulation to what is keeping the problem going.

Try out different ways to problem solve

CBT is not about thinking more positively as thoughts are not facts.

CBT helps the way you feel to improve what you think and what you do. By being able to approach situations in a more balanced way, you will hopefully be more effective in solving your problems and feel more in control of your life.

If you agree CBT is the right treatment for you, you will be expected to meet with your therapist regularly.

To help your therapist to understand your difficulties, you will be asked to complete some questionnaires or worksheets.

These may be repeated throughout your treatment. Your progress within treatment will be monitored and discussed with you on a regular basis, as your views are important.

The therapist will help you understand your problems and help you discover ways of dealing with them.

You will be encouraged to practise them outside of your therapy (for example, at school or college or at home). This means that tasks or homework will be set at the end of the meeting. You may be given worksheets to help remind you of what you need to do.

Why do I have to do homework?

Unfortunately, you cannot learn to ride a bike by reading a book. Any skill you want to learn requires practise.

CBT will help you learn:

how to overcome negative thoughts (she doesn’t like me)

unhelpful behaviours (not going to the party)

difficult emotions (feeling sad)

It is important to practise the CBT skills you are taught for the following reasons:

to be sure that you understand them;

to check that you can use them when you need to (e.g. when you are feeling upset about something);

so that any problems you may have in using these skills can be worked on in your therapy.

It’s not always easy to learn new skills, so you will need lots of support from your therapist, your family/carers.

Information for parents

It is very important that parents are actively involved in their child’s therapy.

What we ask is parents to be part of the therapy 'co therapists' with a shared understanding of the problem, clear understanding and belief in the therapy, shared goals, to help parents understand the formulation and maintenance of the problem but not to blame, to be part of the treatment experiments, monitor progress, understand confidentiality and privacy of the sessions.

http://www.youthaccess.org.uk/ - This website provides information, advice, counselling and support services for young people and also has useful links for parents.

Books

Getting through it with CBT: a young person’s guide – Holdaway, Claire (Book) TeenThis guide is written for young people who want to understand more about how therapy works and what to expect from it. It can support and help you through your process of therapy and can be used alongside therapy.

Getting through depression with CBT: a young person’s guide – Dalton, Louise (Book) TeenThis guide is written for young people who want to understand more about depression and how therapy could help them with this problem.

Getting through Anxiety with CBT: A young person’s guide – Gurney-Smith, Ben

Breaking free from OCD: a CBT guide for young people and their families - Derisley, Jo (Book)